Well, the day of my last post I got some bad news. My blood work that I had done to explain the fatigue I have been feeling since February came back abnormal. So I freaked out. That stress made me susceptible to the cold that was going around my office so I got sick again. I gave up. I was so disheartened to be sick yet again and get my life derailed twice in a few months.
But there is good news. I got over my cold relatively quickly and without anti-biotics (the way I usually do but did not with my February cold). I also had a retest and all but one of my abnormal tests dropped back into the normal range.
The big problem was high muscle enzymes. Like body builder high when I was doing shimmy drills and lifting 3 lb hand weights. My cold might have come at the right time because I stopped everything. As I said, I gave up. My enzymes went down. So while my muscle enzymes were higher than they should have been given the amount of work I was doing, it was coming from that work so that's good news. The bad news is that I don't know why. A reasonable explanation is that the very bad cold in February was more than that, like mono or the flu.
The other bad news is that I am having trouble getting motivated again. I am scared to try anything more than walking because what if it hurts again. Not doing what I love so much also leads to depression and not feeling like I'm good enough. Last night I was lamenting about being scared to dance but in not dancing, I feel like I am not advancing enough and falling behind. But then I wondered, who am I falling behind? Why do we set ourselves up with these imaginary benchmarks? I mean goals are good. Goals give us something to work toward and way to quantify what we are doing. But what about when you don't meet your goal? I wan to be a great dancer but compared to who? Why does it have to be compared to anybody? I feel disadvantaged because of my rural location and age. But why? Why is it not good enough to be the best dancer in my town who's over 30? That should be good enough. I have no desire to teach outside my hometown or travel to get gigs so why am I comparing myself to those who do?
Needless to say, I'm frustrated. I was ready to give it a try this week and I set a schedule, asked my husband to be in charge of dinner for one whole week to take a little off of me and then my favorite Aunt passed away. So, I will be going to Florida for the rest of the week.
Next Monday, I am going to try again. Maybe 15 minutes a day for the first week. I am going to a workshop in Chicago that week-end and if I can't hang then I am perfectly comfortable with hanging back and taking notes. Thankfully, I learn a lot by observing.
